Who is Story-to-Song?

When I begin working with a participant on their Story-to-Song, I hear a few comments on a regular basis:

I have a terrible voice.

I am not an artist. I am not creative.

I do not have any stories that are interesting.

This is where I come in and assure you that your stories are remarkable, in the least because they are a unique element of you. No one other person on the planet has walked in your shoes, and for this reason you are a musical gift just waiting to happen.

Time and again, the inner critic runs the show at the outset of an STS songwriting experience. By the end the composing guide and participant are in full, confident control, and the inner critic is left lurking in the shadows.

To continue, your voice is unique and has music in it. The reason I find it so important for the participant to sing the words of their story is that it is their story. They have emotion and experience in connection with those words, and that meaning comes out in beautiful melodic arcs and strings of notes. If a participant is reticent to sing, I will offer a demonstration. However, when this happens I run the risk of the participant mimicking my own melody. Their notes and voice are lost.

Finally, we are each an artist. We create and shape our lives and the lives of those around us. We create our own reality. We bring our own perspective and voice to the world. We are art. And we are stories.

So, let me know repeat the question:

Who is Story-to-Song?

The answer is all of us.

We each possess myriad thousands of stories that make us who we are. How many of these stories do we share? I have found that the people I work with to bring their stories into song often share a story they have never spoken of before. The more I learn about stories and songwriting, the more convinced I am that I want to spend my life capturing as many stories in song as possible, celebrating and honoring the human experience as my life’s work.